Ambition
by Sresla
Summary: What do you do when the woman you've fallen in love with confesses she loves another man? Nate Amell didn't think there was anything he *could* do when Nienna Surana told him about Jowan – until Jowan came and asked for his advice…


Nate scooted the chair back and turned it around; the _scree _ofwood scraped harshly against the stone floor caused several nearby apprentices to wince at the sound, but none dared call him out for abusing the furniture. The dark-haired mage's temper was legendary and since the Templars seemed disinclined to interfere with their charges – choosing stations for comfort rather than supervision on this sultry Bloomingtide eve - letting his behavior provoke a fight was the last thing any of them wanted. Instead, they bent their heads in concentration over their games of _shatranj, primero _and_ go._

Tipping his seat back, so he balanced on a single leg, Nate ignored the other mages ignoring him and stared up at the statue recessed into the wall's alcove to his right. The tower held dozens of statues that looked nearly identical to this one, elevated on square plinths or cylindrical pedestals but with no plaques to indicate who the carvings were supposed to represent.

He had, on many occasions, the chance to stare at and study the statuary within Kinloch Hold – most often when he was being lectured or spoken to by someone he didn't particularly care for. In those moments, he allowed his gaze to wander; this one struck him differently when he saw it and so, to correct the travesty of it being nameless, Nate christened the figure Romanos – which he abbreviated to Roman. Something in the expression, the way he oversaw the study tables disdainfully as if such pursuits were a waste of time – a theory Nate agreed with, insofar as it pertained to naturally talented individuals such as himself – spoke to him.

Roman might have been a kindred spirit if he'd been flesh, so Nate wasn't particularly surprised when, one day, he found himself mentally addressing the statue. '_There are so few people here truly __**worth**__ speaking to,_' and the immobile gray mouth with the bloodless smile seemed to concur with him. It wasn't, he told himself, that he ever expected Roman to answer – he knew statues didn't talk – more that it was easier to converse with someone who was always in complete agreement with everything he said.

Tonight though, Roman's sardonic grin served to intensify his anger. '_I don't know who's worse – __Nienna for mooning over that idiot or Jowan for being utterly oblivious._' He twisted back around in his chair and dug a toe into the hound's head carpet, worrying the spot where the animal's eyeball should be. Worn threadbare from his repeated attention, the cream fibers now showed patches of marble beneath, giving the burgundy dog a rabid appearance; a lone veined eye glared balefully upward, resentful at being trodden upon. '_Or me,_' he added in a rare burst of personal honesty, '_for wanting what I can't have._'

It wasn't so many months ago he had the elf exactly where he wanted her – in the over-sized wardrobe on the third floor. She required more finesse than his other Tower conquests and when he finally managed to win her over, Nate was surprised to discover she was a virgin. He relished being her first. After she recovered from the initial discomfort that accompanied the taking of her maidenhead, Nienna proved an enthusiastic partner, eager to learn how to stimulate and please a lover.

'_If only it'd been for my benefit,_' he thought bitterly. He believed he was using the red-haired apprentice solely for personal gratification, as was the case with his previous trysts. It wasn't until he had to listen in mortified silence as Nienna made her confession: Her heart belonged to another and she had used Nate's desire for her in order to gain the knowledge she felt she needed before actively pursuing him, that he realized he had fallen in love with her.

He hadn't even recognized the man's name when she referred to him, because he'd never troubled himself over the male figure who shadowed her practically everywhere she went. "Jowan's just… he's who I want." Nienna explained. "We're destined to be together."

"Be together how?" he wanted to scream. The dreamy look in her eyes when she described Jowan answered him better than questioning her ever would.

The elven woman had concocted a fairytale centered on the bumbling simpleton; his imperfections would melt away under the nurturing light of her love, helping him reach his full potential. She suffered under the delusion that whatever was wrong with Jowan – his incompetence, his awkwardness and timidity – could be fixed, like he was a broken plaything needing glue or a stuffed toy with a few unraveled stitches.

Outwardly, he laughed; he assured her their affair was meaningless, that it served to alleviate a physical need while inwardly, he seethed – who _was_ this man that she should so prefer him? Nate shifted his attention from Nienna to Jowan; he scrutinized his competition, searching for the hidden quality that drew the elf to him. The answer was obvious – even Roman with his granite pupils and stony stare might have been able to discern it.

'_He is, in every conceivable way, inferior._' Except Jowan had Nienna (even if he didn't know it) and Nate did not. He would trade every one of his admirers: Thaeri with her unevenly cut brown hair and storm cloud eyes, Liadan with her soft red lips that begged to be kissed, Aerina with her gold jewelry jangling like a belled cat everywhere she went and a score of others if only Nienna looked at him the same way. '_And tonight, she… he… they…_' Someone had left a sheet of parchment on the desk and he touched a finger to the tattered edge, watching the tracery of fire worm its way upward, consuming the paper with a single wavering plume of smoke.

Nienna planned this night for months. It was an anniversary of theirs; she wanted her preparations to be a surprise and Nate was sure Jowan was ignorant of the day's significance so it would – literally – come as a shock to the other man. "I've waited so long to tell him how I feel." He learned to keep his thoughts about Jowan to himself because any discussion ended in a quarrel. She never called him jealous but Nate wondered if she knew.

He undid the thong holding his hair back, letting it fall loose around his shoulders. Despite the elven woman's claim he was handsomer with it down, her habit of tucking stray hairs behind his ears made the style too similar to Jowan's for his own comfort; he did not like thinking she tried to make him into an image of the other man. He raked a hand through it, felt a strand catch on the gold loop in his left ear and with a huff of impatience, began untangling it in order to rebind it. As he tilted his head to the side, he caught movement out of the corner of his eye – someone was walking toward him. When he saw who it was, he glanced back quickly at the statue. '_Friend Roman, lend me your spear._'

"Hello." Jowan said and when the other mage didn't respond, he repeated himself. "Uhh, hello Nate." The uncomfortable silence stretched out; Nate saw sweat bead up at Jowan's hairline. "Is Nienna with you?"

Was there a reason to be civil anymore? After tonight, she'd be lost to him, blissfully entrenched in the culmination of her dream come true. "Yes, she's under my robe. Come out, Nienna dear, you have a visitor." With a theatrical tug on the seam, he swished it back and forth just above his ankles. Jowan continued to stare as if he'd vanished her into thin air and, repulsed at the idea he might continue to stand there waiting for Nienna to re-materialize, Nate relented. "She isn't here, Jowan."

"Good." Without requesting permission to join him, Jowan sat down heavily in the adjacent vacant chair; he remained quiet for a moment then began to wring his hands, clasping them tightly together. "I'm supposed to meet her tonight; she said she'd help me with my frost spells. I just can't get the hang of Winter's Grasp. She makes it look so easy whenever she does it. Just a..." he waved, a gesture Nate assumed was meant to represent spell casting along with a noise sounding suspiciously like _brr_, "and things are frozen."

Nate considered how long it might take someone to interfere if he decided to turn Jowan into a human torch. '_It would almost be worth Aeonar._' Instead, he said curtly, "You're bad at magic – what a revelation."

"I think I might have feelings for her," Jowan blurted out and, misunderstanding Nate's murderous glare, wailed, "I know it's wrong. She's like… like a sister to me. We grew up together and thinking about her like that – to even… even…" His words trailed off, his hands twitching uselessly in his lap.

Nate had placed his palm on the desktop and when he heard Jowan's stuttered admission, his temper erupted through his skin; he scorched the wood, leaving behind a handprint as an indelible reminder of his rage. He half-rose out of his seat but a voice in his head restrained him, preventing his reprisal. '_Little minds are subdued by misfortunes, but great minds rise above them, Nate Amell._'

Jowan knew the two of them weren't on friendly terms; Nate never so much as acknowledged his presence unless in the company of Nienna and then only as much as courtesy – and staying on the elf's good side – demanded. '_It means he must be __**desperate**__ to confide in me,_' although Jowan was – aside from their mutual acquaintance Anders and Nienna herself of course – friendless, "_and that can be a justification for all __**kinds**__ of behavior._' Selfish to be thankful Anders was back in solitary confinement after his latest escape attempt, but with what was at stake, the overzealous blond mage might forgive the uncharitable thought – assuming it was Nate he'd be sympathetic to. Anders' overlooking an unspoken feeling was the least of his worries as Jowan continued his pitiful litany about his conflicted emotions. Nate slowly sank back down into his chair, listening and waiting for the right opportunity to interject.

"When she talks about cherry chocolates, she gets this hungry look like she can't wait to put one in her mouth and then I think about what else she could put in her mouth and I feel it, you know, down…" Jowan gasped for breath, babbling out his angst in one continuous sentence, "down there and it makes me so ashamed, because under the eye of the Maker it would be like… like–"

"Like lusting after one of the Tranquil?" said smoothly with a hint of revulsion, as if Nate also believed in the implied incestuousness the other man described. Jowan's fear of the Tower's Tranquil bordered on phobia and the dark-haired mage saw the fleeting look of horror pass across his face at the mere mention of a parallel. '_He'll forever associate these feelings with this, now – not even Nienna stripping him naked and trying to mount him will erase it. He'd shrivel like an overripe parsnip._' However, it was too soon to crow about his success; there was still the matter of Jowan's permanent removal as a rival for Nienna's affections. The other man might never see her as anything but a sister, but _she_ would continue to pine for _him_ unless an insurmountable obstacle lay in her path.

He needed to word it carefully, so his suggestion was persuasive. "Not that I'm any great believer in Chantry rhetoric, but when _I_ seek peace of mind, I visit the chapel on the second floor." Nate retied his hair as he talked, knotting the leather tight. "The Templars look kindly on those observing the proper devotions," Jowan's sneaking out of bounds with Nienna earned him his fair share of reprimands, "and it's a place where Nienna would _never_ think to look for you."

All valid, perfectly reasonable reasons, given offhandedly so as not to make Jowan suspicious, but sending him upstairs would – unless Nate missed his guess – provide him with more than solitude to contemplate his feelings and commune with the Maker and his chosen prophet. There was also… Lily.

Poor, butter faced Lily. '_Everything's marvelous but her face._' Forced by her family to enter the priesthood, she resented her current station. Nate hadn't particularly cared when she told him her story – she was from a farm with too many mouths to feed and the miller's wife didn't care for the glances her husband gave her ('_What must __**she**__ look like, if he coveted Lily,_' he remembered thinking at the time) – being more interested in seeing what lay hidden under her habit. Her body proved just as enticing as the formfitting gown promised. If he shut his eyes and just listened to her voice – which _was_ beautiful, equally suited to moans of pleasure or reciting the Chant – he could almost forget, for example, that her eyebrows looked as if an inept mage had burned them off and then attempted to redraw them with a piece of charcoal.

Nate preferred to keep his eyes _open_ during sex, so the relationship hadn't lasted; it wouldn't have worked anyway. Lily talked about leaving the Tower; running away and finding a place to settle and start a family but he never seriously contemplated ever leaving his home and certainly had no intention to set aside his magic in order to grow potatoes.

Jowan, on the other hand, was inexperienced and naïve enough to believe that sort of attention equated to love, rather than a desire to be free of the Tower and the confines of the Chantry. Lily herself was no fool, and should recognize an opportunity when she spoke to him. Once bedded, Jowan would be firmly devoted to her forever – and unattainable by the elven woman. Jowan would eventually tell Nienna about the affair – the two shared everything in a mimicry of the familial bond the other man was so afraid of now – and when he did, '_It will crush her._'

Jowan sounded surprised – maybe he _had_ expected Nate to burn him to a cinder. "I… thank you, Nate. It sounds like exactly what I need."

Nate dismissed his role with a casual shrug of his shoulders. As Jowan smiled at him, pathetically grateful for his advice, he was filled with a sense of contentment, '_and I'll be there to pick up the pieces._'

* * *

My entry for drathe's contest over on deviantART. This story is based on her original character, Nate Amell, whom she describes thusly:

"_Ohh, Nate is such badass XD He's Jowan's rival and he really, but really hates him xD He's pretty popular with girls, because he's smart and good looking man, and, well.. he loves that fact. He's such a heartbreaker xD He may seem to be calm and serious, but he's not like that - he just loves to provoke people just for fun or get involved into fights - just to show how strong is he's angry, he hardly controls himself. He almost always gets what he wants. He's very confident and arrogant sometimes, and that's why he don't have too many friends. But, when someone is important for him, he's very caring and loyal friend. Also, he was Nienna's first man =3= He survived the Blight and later he decided to join the Wardens. In the depth of his heart he loves Circle and he treats mages as his family, even if he won't say it loud_"

Proofreading and punctuation are pants. Nate Amell and Nienna Surana belong to drathe. In addition, credit goes to Washington Irving, Jessica Walter and William Shakespeare (sort of) whose quotes I used. Feedback is welcome and encouraged (criticism is just as valued as praise).

I'd give all my worldly goods (and my soul, if they'd take it) to Bioware and David Gaider in exchange for Zevran being mine (all mine!), but until they accept my "offer", all rights to their characters and the Dragon Age universe belong to them. Thank you, DG, for creating Zevran – in all my years of playing MUDs, MUSHs, RPGs and MMOs, he's the only character who ever inspired me to write anything (such as it is - and even when he's not in the story, he's my inspiration).


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